SC Game: How Much Difference Would Caroline and Azzi Really Make?

[Sluconn Husky]

Impossible to know, but sure would've been nice to find out.

 

[90BSEE]

For some reason that I haven't figured out, the screens and cuts that usually provide open looks for 3-point shots weren't working today

That is EXACTLY the problem! Last year we had Azzi, Caroline and Paige and still couldn't get off a clean shot. The reason you seek is FOULING! It is hard to get open when being grabbed and pushed into other players. It is hard to drive when being grabbed and pushed. It is hard to rebound when being grabbed and pushed.

The refs called a decent number of fouls against SC today. That is why the game was close. They were able to get SOME shots off. But the refs could have called even more and should have called more. A foul is a foul.

The one thing I have seen this year is a willingness and ability to take and hit a mid-range shot. Those are critical to beating SC because we won't be able to score inside and they will hack us on the perimeter and keep our shooters from getting open. Caroline and Azzi would give us depth so players can play less and move more when they are on the floor. That would help them get open more. BUT, when we lost Paige, we lost our most important piece because she can create and score in the mid-range better than anyone. Dorka, Alliyah and Aubrey need to keep shooting those mid-range shots that have improved on so much. That is the SC antidote and we have improved that a lot since last year.

 

[hoopsnloops32]

What I'm saying add Azzi to the lineup and you move your most athletic wing in Aubrey to the bench. Now you are at a much more deficit at rebounding. Also Aubrey did an excellent job of defending Cooke. Does that trade off help. I don't know. I feel like to beat sc you gotta neutralize the disperancy in rebounding and second chance points.

Why are you taking out Aubrey? Why don’t you take out Nika? Obviously not for the whole game but the game plan was more suited to Azzi running the point since the offensive game plan was to go one on one.

 

[npignatjr]

I don't know if they are as effective. Aubrey is long and athletic. She posed a big problem to Cooke. Imshe couldn't shoot over her and couldn't drive past her. I don't see Fludd or Carol having that foot speed and burst. Aubrey was fantastic today on defense.

Caroline is taller Azzi almost as tall, both better in team defense ax UCONN switches on screens and played a lot of zone. Aubrey is athletic.

 

[reelfan]

With our entire team on the floor we must be the favorites. SC is a grab and bang team that cannot defend against creative play makers that consistently shoot 3s. The difference this year is Lou and a healthy Aubrey.

 

[JBK]

Just look at the box score for your answers: Nika with only four assists ( 2 for most of the game), Juhasz and Edwards combined for only 11 rebounds, Lou only 1 for 2 from 3 point arc. SC basically shut down most of what UConn does really, really well. Give them some credit.

and we still scored 77 and Dorka did not really participate- not bad at all. They also exploded in 1 Q with 25.
Before the intentional foul outs at the end, I think UConn looked like the team with energy and SC looked tired.
Players playing 40 minutes is not the problem - it is the foul trouble that brings. A lot of our fouls occurred when we did not get the defensive rebound.

 

[Dognusty]

Why are you taking out Aubrey? Why don’t you take out Nika? Obviously not for the whole game but the game plan was more suited to Azzi running the point since the offensive game plan was to go one on one.

Best ball handler would not take her out.

 

[Centerstream]

I am guessing that it would have been a net +25 points. Just my guess.

 

[Urshurak]

... only if she could get open for 3's. That is the question that I'm raising -- could she get open against today's SC defense?

How many players can SC play at one time? I think it's just 5?

So, who's gonna guard Azzi AND Lou? Significantly harder since someone will have to come out of the paint to help, opening up AE and/or Dorka.

So to answer your question, yes. Would have made a BIG difference.

 

[meyers7]

... only if she could get open for 3's. That is the question that I'm raising -- could she get open against today's SC defense?

Shutting down one shooter is a little easier than shutting down three...

What Baton Rouge said.

S. Carolina wouldn't have been able to clog up the paint as well either, making drives to the basket easier too. Drives and kick outs work better when you have more than one option to kick it out to.

 

[Charliebball]

I've always thought challenging South Carolina's big front line by driving to the lane was a good strategy, hoping that they would get in some foul trouble................they are near impossible to beat on the boards at either end of the court so you have to hope they are having a bad shooting day and while you are shooting at a high rate..........having Azzi would have made a difference in that you're adding her excellent shooting and likely freeing up Lou to get a few more easy shots...........I sure hope UConn gets another shot to prove that thesis is correct........

 

[Jaml]

This seems really right, judging from what I saw. Nika, Aubrey, and especially Lou torched them on drives. That's what you do when you're being face guarded. Remember that one foul on Cooke when she went to the floor with a bloody nose. That was because she was so close to Lou she couldn't even turn without contact. This is what they were doing all game, and Lou made them pay for it. This was also a dimension of Lou's game we haven't seen as much of -- the smooth handles and the tenacity at the rim. I hope pro scouts were paying attention.

Something that was completely overlooked about that play with Lou (and the reason Cooke took a shoulder) was that Cooke pulled Lou in grabbing her jersey. We would have had a few more assists in this game had Lou been able to draw a foul on back cuts to the rim. She was getting grabbed and the officials let it go, leading to a turnover because Lou couldn't get to the ball. Lou gets beat up, yet she is the one fouling out of the game. Boston had one personal foul in that game...really? The officials had no problem calling fouls on Cardoso, but let Boston doing whatever she wanted.

 

[hoopsnloops32]

Best ball handler would not take her out.

Azzis probably on par with Nika there. The plan this season was for Azzi to be back up point guard.

 

[BBallF]

Shutting down one shooter is a little easier than shutting down three...

Exactly and the key point is that if you have a CD or Azzi making 3s it opens the middle and they were very very driveable against. I mean really, if they each make 1 three we win the game. We should feel good about the game even though the officiating was frustrating as all heck and one of the worst jobs ever.

 

[oldhusky]

Since everyone is covering the differences between lineups with different players pretty thoroughly, I wanted to point out how having so few players hurts us in other ways. We can say well that player would have done better than this one, but I think we sometimes forget that every player being used for heavy minutes will be better with a bigger rotation. If we add Azzi and Caroline later, Nika, Lou, Aubrey, Aaliyah and Dorka can all be more productive when they are on the court.

Much of that is not being fatigued. At these minutes they can't be 100% all the time. They have to pick their spots, learn to conserve energy in spots etc. Lou in particular is playing under the handicap of being the opponents defense focus. If Azzi is in the game, she will draw that attention, and with Caroline we should always have two major three point threats instead of one on the floor most of the time, so yes spacing matters for the others too.

Turning to Geno, his hands have been tied in so many ways. When you only have one bench player you want to use (Ayanna) and then only as little as necessary, your game management and practice schedules are totally disrupted. He can't call timeouts for strategic purposes very often, he has to have them managed at intervals to give his players rest to avoid substitutions. He can't insert players for strategic purposes off the bench or make multiple moves because if it is a rotation of 6 your resting player has to be ready to go back in before you can take another one out.

Practices are not as effective because you have to limit time to preserve energy for the games, and you may not have enough players to even do 5 on 5. So it is far more than just this new healthy player will be an upgrade over who we are using now. The players we are using now will be better when rested, have more opportunities when we can spread the floor and have more options for opponents to worry about, we will have better practices, and during the game Geno can take timeouts, and make substitutions strategically, and press and fast break more if he wants to.

 

[boontonbomber]

I did slog through the entire Postgame Thread for the South Carolina game. When you get past the referee complaints, there seems to be a consensus that if UConn only lost by 4 points with its current active roster, then it should certainly win when Caroline and Azzi are added to the mix. Geno elaborated on the thinking behind this position during his press conference, where he said that the only way for this roster to beat SC is to take and make enough 3's to offset the 2's that the Gamecocks are inevitably going to get on the offensive boards.

He implied pretty strongly that even with a 10-player roster, UConn this year doesn't have the horses to really contest SC's offensive boards -- he said that to do that, you would need about four 6-5 players who could be freely substituted so that none of them would have to worry about fouls. Unfortunately, I think he's right, and that will still be the case when Azzi and Caroline return. It would be different if Ice were returning or if Jana could play immediately. So I think it's unlikely that UConn will do better against SC's O-boards in April than they did in today's game.

But (so the theory goes) when Azzi and Caroline are on the floor, SC won't be able to drape Lou and those three shooters (with one or two timely contributions from Nika and Aubrey) can make enough 3's to offset SC's second-chance points. But I'm not sure that I buy into that theory. The reason is that SC's defensive plan today was to guard UConn's perimeter shooters so closely that 3's were not open, even if it meant that those perimeter players could drive past them, which UConn certainly did. (Did anyone notice that UConn actually got more points in the paint today than SC, by a margin of 42-38?) Dawn apparently figured that if she could turn UConn's 3-point shooters into 2-point penetrators, SC would win that trade-off, and that is exactly what happened.

For some reason that I haven't figured out, the screens and cuts that usually provide open looks for 3-point shots weren't working today, or weren't being used. I do think that Azzi and Caroline are better than any of today's players at seeing where they can move without the ball to get open, so that may be the difference that they will make. I certainly hope so ...

I did slog through the entire Postgame Thread for the South Carolina game. When you get past the referee complaints, there seems to be a consensus that if UConn only lost by 4 points with its current active roster, then it should certainly win when Caroline and Azzi are added to the mix. Geno elaborated on the thinking behind this position during his press conference, where he said that the only way for this roster to beat SC is to take and make enough 3's to offset the 2's that the Gamecocks are inevitably going to get on the offensive boards.

He implied pretty strongly that even with a 10-player roster, UConn this year doesn't have the horses to really contest SC's offensive boards -- he said that to do that, you would need about four 6-5 players who could be freely substituted so that none of them would have to worry about fouls. Unfortunately, I think he's right, and that will still be the case when Azzi and Caroline return. It would be different if Ice were returning or if Jana could play immediately. So I think it's unlikely that UConn will do better against SC's O-boards in April than they did in today's game.

But (so the theory goes) when Azzi and Caroline are on the floor, SC won't be able to drape Lou and those three shooters (with one or two timely contributions from Nika and Aubrey) can make enough 3's to offset SC's second-chance points. But I'm not sure that I buy into that theory. The reason is that SC's defensive plan today was to guard UConn's perimeter shooters so closely that 3's were not open, even if it meant that those perimeter players could drive past them, which UConn certainly did. (Did anyone notice that UConn actually got more points in the paint today than SC, by a margin of 42-38?) Dawn apparently figured that if she could turn UConn's 3-point shooters into 2-point penetrators, SC would win that trade-off, and that is exactly what happened.

For some reason that I haven't figured out, the screens and cuts that usually provide open looks for 3-point shots weren't working today, or weren't being used. I do think that Azzi and Caroline are better than any of today's players at seeing where they can move without the ball to get open, so that may be the difference that they will make. I certainly hope so ...

Screens and cuts that work against Big East teams don't work so well against the #1 team defense in the country.

 

[Wbbfan1]

We scored more in the paint than they did.

You should add the Free Throws that Boston and Cardoso made to their totals. Majority of there free throws were caused by getting fouls called down low.

 

[RedStickHusky]

Much of that is not being fatigued. At these minutes they can't be 100% all the time. They have to pick their spots, learn to conserve energy in spots etc. Lou in particular is playing under the handicap of being the opponents defense focus. If Azzi is in the game, she will draw that attention, and with Caroline we should always have two major three point threats instead of one on the floor most of the time, so yes spacing matters for the others too.

All spot on... The lack of depth also causes an absolute imperative to avoid foul trouble... want to take a charge, drive hard into the lane, battle on the boards, play an aggressive pressing defense; players have to think twice about all of these things when a quick whistle or two sends you to the bench and we don't really have a competitive replacement to bring in.

 

[meyers7]

I feel the way to win is to take away the second chance points. No amount of offense firepower is gonna change what they do. Make them one and done and then those missed jump shots have a penalty. Now it doesn't really matter if they miss or hit.

Like Geno said, we don't have the ability (the players) to do that. Hence we need to trade 3s for 2s.

 

[hookshot]

Based on the final score and the overall way the team played, I was very surprised. I expected SC to crush us by at least 20 points. Had Geno not shot the team in the foot with that untimely technical, we might have even won? Sometimes coaches purposely light a fire under a team by getting a technical foul called on them. However, our fire was already lite at that time and his act nearly put it out. It's hard to be critical of Geno, but this was not his finest coaching game.

Coach Staley knew we had no one other than Lou who could score 3s consistently, so she draped her defensively as often as possible. Zia Cooke did an outstanding job on her individually.

With a healthy Azzi and/or Caroline we could easily have won this game. At present Patterson is pretty much an offensive liability. So why wasn't Amari (one of those 6'5" players Geno wished he had to use against SC), used until the last 17 seconds of the game??? Another minus rating in Geno's coaching in this game.

Kamilla Cardoso would start on any other team in the country and most likely have a shot at NPOY.

Agree with much of this. Empty possessions are an issue in any close game. The technical cost one lost possession and two points, but there were 3 other empty possessions caused by inability to inbound the ball (that is uncharacteristic of Uconn). In two of the 3, if not all 3, it appeared that they were so focused on running a set play that they ignored the ole CYO rule that if the passer is in trouble, you come to the ball. Add those 4 empty possessions to the few "open" looks that failed to produce points and you may have had enough to tip the score. You aren't likely going to overhaul SC, playing from behind. You need to maintain a lead. Another rough 2nd quarter took that opportunity away. The game was a mix of lost opportunities and spectacular individual efforts and team play. I think Geno, the team, and the fans) got what they needed out of this game, a lessons learned on the match-up of these two teams, and a reinforcement that this Uconn team is a legitimate contender for a final 4 and NC

 

[bballer]

Question How much difference would caroline and azzi really make We Win!!

 

[hookshot]

That is EXACTLY the problem! Last year we had Azzi, Caroline and Paige and still couldn't get off a clean shot. The reason you seek is FOULING! It is hard to get open when being grabbed and pushed into other players. It is hard to drive when being grabbed and pushed. It is hard to rebound when being grabbed and pushed.

The refs called a decent number of fouls against SC today. That is why the game was close. They were able to get SOME shots off. But the refs could have called even more and should have called more. A foul is a foul.

The one thing I have seen this year is a willingness and ability to take and hit a mid-range shot. Those are critical to beating SC because we won't be able to score inside and they will hack us on the perimeter and keep our shooters from getting open. Caroline and Azzi would give us depth so players can play less and move more when they are on the floor. That would help them get open more. BUT, when we lost Paige, we lost our most important piece because she can create and score in the mid-range better than anyone. Dorka, Alliyah and Aubrey need to keep shooting those mid-range shots that have improved on so much. That is the SC antidote and we have improved that a lot since last year.

Great point on the mid-range shots - Dorka and Aubey continue to be challenged on those (each missed one or more open looks against SC) and Edwards passes up some opportunities which means some continuing lack of confidence (despite a lot of success). Azzi, in particular, really upgrades the mid-range capability and CD's style of cruising the full court and popping up in open spots near the basket adds a lot. They complete the full inventory of weapons needed to potentially win an NC.

 

[Bone Dog]

So true! Or, as some would have it, we should play away from our strength and focus on rebounding.

Actually, to be fair, the folks who keep harping on this are really just hoping for a different team to show up in Storrs this summer, and I can totally sympathize with that. Snatching an NC as a finesse/perimeter team would be awesome. But I’d also like to see powerhouse UConn again. For now, however, we’ll just have to see how far finesse can get us.

And, who knows, maybe regaining our perimeter attack will open up the lane so Nika and Aubrey can get more rebounds.